JPH0313077B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a printer control device that accurately measures the operation time of each part of the printer, such as platen change operation time and type selection time, so that it can be read out when necessary. The present invention relates to a printer control device.

For example, in a serial printer, when starting a line, the platen is rotated by the line. When performing this line break, as shown in FIG.
A line feed command is transmitted from the print 2 to the print 2.
This line feed command is input to the line feed control circuit 3 of the printer 2. At this time, the line feed control circuit 3 sends an operating signal (busy signal) to the control section 1 and rotates the platen 4 by, for example, one line. Then, the operating signal (busy signal) is dropped. When the operating signal (busy signal) drops, the control section 1 learns that the changeover operation of the platen 4 has been completed, and sends a print command. The print control circuit 5 receives this print command, outputs an operating signal (busy signal) to the control section 1, and simultaneously controls the print section 6 based on this print command to perform the instructed printing.

In such cases, you may want to measure the platen change operation time, but conventionally, in such cases,
The operating signal (busy signal) shown in FIG _. 2B, which is sent from the line feed control circuit 3 based on the line feed command shown in FIG. Therefore, such a measurement method has disadvantages in that the measurement results are inaccurate and a special oscilloscope is required for the measurement.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a printer control device which can overcome these drawbacks and read measurement results very accurately when needed. For this purpose, the printer control device according to the present invention receives an operation command from the control section, operates the printer mechanism section in accordance with the operation command, and also operates the printer mechanism section in response to the operation command. A printer control device comprising a control section for outputting an in-operation signal, and a clock counting means for counting a reference clock while the in-operation signal is being output, and a clock counting means for counting a reference clock, and a count value of the clock counting means, The present invention is characterized in that the printer control device includes a count value output means that is applied to the printer mechanism section and outputs a print based on a print command from the control section.

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4.

In the following embodiments, the operating signal is treated as a busy signal.

FIG. 3 shows the configuration of an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of its operation.

In the figure, the same reference numerals as in other figures indicate the same parts, and 10
1 is a control unit, 11 is a printer, 12 is a counter, 1
3 is an oscillator, 14 is a counter print control section, and 15 is a print control section.

The control section 10 is a control section that controls the printer 11, and corresponds to the control section 1 in FIG.

The printer 11 performs printing operations using the control section 10, and corresponds to the printer 2 in FIG. The printer 11 includes a platen 4, a printing section 6, a counter 1 in addition to the printing control section 15.
2, an oscillator 13, a counter print control section 14, and a line feed control section 16 are provided.

The counter 12 counts the pulses oscillated by the oscillator 13 as shown in FIG. 4C, and performs the counting operation only while the busy signal shown in FIG. 4B is output.

The counter print control section 14 performs control for printing out the count value of the counter 12.

The printing control section 15 performs various controls for causing the printing section 6 to perform printing operations, and corresponds to the printing control circuit 5 in FIG. 1. Further, the line feed control section 16 controls driving of the platen 4 at the time of line feed, and corresponds to the line feed control circuit 3 in FIG. 1.

Next, the operation shown in FIG. 3 will be explained with reference to FIG. 4.

In order to measure the speed of the line feed operation in the printer 11, the control unit 10 outputs a line feed command to the printer 11 at time _T1 , as shown in FIG. 4A. This line feed command is transmitted to the line feed control unit 16, and as a result, at time _T2 , the line feed control unit 16 starts controlling the rotation of the platen 4 by one line and outputs a busy signal.

This busy signal is applied to the counter 12 and also transmitted to the control section 10. As a result, the counter 12 starts counting the pulses output from the oscillator 13 as shown in FIG. 4C. The above line feed command is the time
Although it falls at T ₃ , rotation control for platen 4 continues until time T ₄ , and at time T ₄ , platen 4
When the row rotation is completed, the busy signal drops and the counting operation of the counter 12 stops. and counter 1
2 holds the count value of the pulses transmitted between T ₂ and _{T 4} as is.

Next, in order to read the count value of this counter 12 from the control section 10, a counter print command is sent out at time _T5 , and the command is transmitted to the counter print control section 14.
As a result, the counter print control section 14 prints the counter 1
Read the count value transmitted from 2. Then, at time _T5 , a print command is output from the control unit 10,
When this is transmitted to the print control unit 15, the print control unit 15 starts operating, and the counter 1
The count value transmitted from 2 is transmitted to the print control section 15, and the print control section 15 is operated.
Thus, at time T ₆ , the print control unit 15
operate to print the counted value on the
A busy signal is output at time _T7 . and the time
Although the counter print command fails at _T8 ,
The printing section 6 completes printing at time _T9 , and thus the busy signal drops at time _T10 . In this way, the number of pulses counted by the counter 12 during the changing operation time of the platen 4 from time T ₂ to T ₄ can be accurately known, and by printing this out, the changing operation time can be accurately determined. .
If the counter 12 or the counter print control section 14 is configured to output a time corresponding to the number of pulses, the operating time can be immediately read out.

Furthermore, if the counter 12 is operated according to the type selection time and the hammer driving time, or according to the space operation period of the carriage, these operation times can be similarly measured and printed out. Can be done.

As explained above, according to the present invention, the operating time of each part of such a printer, which was conventionally measured visually using an oscilloscope, can be measured using a clock counting means and also printed out from the printing section of the printer itself. This makes it possible to recognize the information very accurately and very easily, making it very effective for monitoring the operating status of a printer, such as during testing.

If the operating time is not output by the printer itself but by another output means, a driver, a sending line, etc. will be required in order to send the time measurement result of the clock counting means to that output means. Moreover, since control is required to output this, the hardware configuration and control must be complicated, but the present invention makes this possible with an extremely simple configuration and control.

Furthermore, even when a plurality of printers are lined up to perform a test operation, since the printer itself outputs the output, it is easy to correspond to the timing results and the printers. Moreover, since no other output means is required, the operation of the printer can be checked by itself.

Of course, the present invention can also be applied to serial printers.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

1 and 2 are explanatory diagrams of a conventional printer control device, and FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of an embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of its operating state. In the figure, 1 is a control unit, 2 is a printer, 4 is a platen, 6 is a print unit, 10 is a control unit, 11 is a printer, 12 is a counter, 13 is an oscillator, 14 is a counter print control unit, and 15 is a print control unit are shown respectively.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. Receiving an operation command from a control unit, operating the printer mechanism according to the operation command, and outputting an operating signal to the control unit while performing the operation. A printer control device comprising a control section, a clock counting means for counting a reference clock while the operating signal is being outputted, and a clock counting means for counting a reference clock while the operating signal is output, and a count value of the clock counting means is used as a print command from the control section. What is claimed is: 1. A printer control device comprising: a count value output means for outputting a printout by giving the count value to the printer mechanism based on the printer control device.